The weather was on everyone's mind last week at school. A typhoon was threatening The Philippines and we have a number of students of Filipino descent. The big national story was Hurricane Florence which was bearing down on the Carolinas. On Friday, after first period, I checked into the upper school office before I headed to my second period 8th grade Bible class. Before we prayed, I relayed the most recent news on the storm front and that was Florence had been downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane. We talked about the fact that while that update would be received with joy, a Category 1 hurricane is still a hurricane and incredibly dangerous, loaded with the baggage which accompanies these weather catastrophes. Using the storm rating system as a backdrop, I asked the boys in the class several questions to spur their thought processes. Would you rather be the shortest tall guy or the tallest short guy? Obviously, the shortest tall guy as you're still tall. Then, we got into the slowest fast guy or the fastest slow guy? The ugliest handsome guy or the most handsome ugly guy? The poorest rich guy or the richest poor guy? When they took a minute to think about it, they may have gotten the hang of it. I'm not sure if I would have at that age. Labeling can be misleading on many different levels.
Several years ago, I wrote a blog about an NBA player named Shawn Bradley who was roundly dismissed as an athlete yet he had a long career in pro basketball as well as earning $70 million for his efforts. When I asked some of our WCS high school kids about Bradley, they all said he was terrible. It didn't matter what stats I quoted; they ridiculed him even though he played in the best league on the planet and they never would. The first time I heard teenage athletes dismiss a player was with the gentleman picture above, Will Perdue. It was in Tennessee and Perdue had played at Vanderbilt so the kids knew him. They mocked him and like Shawn Bradley, rated Perdue as terrible. It didn't matter if he was the SEC Player of the YEAR (think Kentucky) or the SEC Male Athlete of the the YEAR or that he would go on to be part of four NBA title teams with both the Bulls and the Spurs. If they were weathermen, they would have tagged Will Perdue as a Category 1 NBA baller. So go back to my original questions to my eighth grade boys. Would you rather be the worst player in the NBA (which Perdue was obviously not) or the best player not in the NBA? It seems to me to be an easy choice.
Comparisons are part of life and so are ratings. I'm amazed that when I was in China, all the young people wanted to know about the rankings of US universities. I was pretty clueless as I really think that isn't much of an issue with American kids who are looking more for a good fit. But there is carryover into religion as well. Which church has the most members? What preacher has baptized the most converts? Who sends out the most missionaries? That's not new. Paul references tension with those he calls, probably facetiously, super-apostles. John the Baptist's followers were jealous of Jesus baptizing. If God's will is being done, does it matter? A saint is a saint is a saint although we all have different gifts and abilities. We also all have different struggles and temptations we struggle with. Rating other's value in athletics isn't very scientific although it's great fun for the fan and the want to be big timer, which all of us who played wanted to be! The same could be said for our lives in the pursuit of Godliness. It's probably not the most spiritual pursuit to classify our fellow believers. Most of us are probably Category 1 anyway on the 5 to 1 scale used for storms. Do you know what I think is a working definition of Category 1 believers? Saved. That's good enough for me.
Applicable quote of the day:
"Guys let their egos get in the way and they see that so and so has a commercial and they wonder, “How come I don’t have a commercial?” And they see that so and so is adored by the fans and they wonder, “How come they don’t love me?” So and so is playing more minutes than you, and they wonder, “How come so and so is playing more minutes? I’m just as good as him.” Just put your head down, man, and grind it out; figure it out. I think guys get too caught up in all the fringe stuff and it affects how they play and ultimately, that’s what you’re judged on."
Will Perdue (on advice he would give rookies)
God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1
www.hawleybooks.com
E-mail me at steve@hawleybooks.com
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